The seasons all come to this farm. It is astonishing how far they 
come to enjoy this view. Birds from far-off woodlands bordering on 
the gulf come here and nest. I think highly of their taste. They know 
where to come. Thank goodness there are some creatures which, 
whatever the lack of the esthetic on the part of the many, retain a fine 
Greek taste for the beautiful. The seasons all come here annually. I 
have never known them to miss. They are as regular as 1 am, and 
enjoy this farm with a gusto which is warming to my heart. Sometimes 
one season comes first, sometimes another. That depends entirely on 
what season you begin with. I begin with winter. Winter on this 
estate is a rare season. The land lies brown and beautiful. The many 
colors of a winter landscape are things not sufficently attended to in 
popular thinking. People talk as if winter fields were uneventful and 
monotonous. Nothing is less true. Winter browns are quite as varied as 
summer greens. My woods stand black in winter, especially when the 
skies are gray with no hint of sunlight, the trees standing against such a 
sky look black as stormy water. Nature indulges in no black colors 
in vegetation save this. And | have seen my woods gloom against a 
winter evening sky like a rising storm-cloud. They are prodigal in this 
tempestuous quality. I love to look at it so, and can all but hear the 
mutter of the thunder which in summer booms intermittently from black 
thunder heads. And if you walk into the fields, the grasses are of 
varied hues. Some are light-toned, almost gray, some a deep russet, 
some species of slough grass are like browns touched with flame full of 
surprise and delight, and the wheat stubble keeps its old gold all the 
winter through, and corn stalks have the richness of color which minds 
the eye of a lion’s skin brown as the desert he goes fleetly across; 
and golden-rod stands in the hedge-corners grouped in its miniature 
forests graceful in form as when they lean plumes of gold in autumn 
noons, but now the plumes are white like those which nod in a knight’s 
helmet. This golden-rod flames out gold in autumn and snow in winter, 
and whether to love the more its gold or snow I know not. They belong 
to the two seasons and in either are radiant to my eyes. Weeds are brave 
winter folk. Flowers die in autumn, and even in the woods the bunches 
of violet leaves are pressed flat against the earth and have lost their 
green, or it is almost altogether blotted out, but weeds stand self-reliant 
nodding to the shivering winds. Winter weeds are prepared foods for 
the birds. They are their winter pasture fields. God is so thoughtful in 
leaving for his birds a spread table, standing high above the snow fall 
all 
